The renewable energy industry is applauding President Obama and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency after the EPA approved a 28% increase in the amount of biodiesel mandated for use in trucks on the nation's highways for 2013. Biodiesel is made in a process that uses soybeans, while the production of ethanol is based on corn.

The president of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, Brad Albin, said, "I want to thank President Obama and his staff for listening to our concerns and recognizing the value and potential of America’s Advanced Biofuel—biodiesel.”

The biodiesel industry is celebrating because unlike mandates for the use of ethanol in the nation's fuel set forth in the 2007 Renewable Fuels Act, biodiesel didn't have a mandate until last year. That mandates set a goal of 800 million gallons. The new mandate for 2013 has been expanded to 1 billion gallons, and fell short of the 1.28 billion gallons that biodiesel producers wanted.

“This was an incredibly important decision, and the Obama Administration got it right,” said Joe Jobe, CEO of the National Biodiesel Board, the industry trade association.

“It will allow biodiesel plants across the country to invest and expand, creating thousands of jobs. At the same time, it sends a strong signal that the U.S. is standing firm behind its commitment to producing clean, American-made energy to strengthen our energy security and break our dependence on petroleum.”

When the mandate was introduced in 2011 at 800 million gallons, it helped prevent the closure of several of the nation's biodiesel plants.

Ethanol production has come under fire for driving up prices on the food crop, however, there is no indication that the same will happen for soybeans.

I don't blame Obama for all the increases in fuel costs over 4 years. I do however blame Obama for doing nothing to help fuel costs from going up in the past 4 years.

As stated yes there are more onshore, private wells now than 4 years ago. But thanks to permits issued under Bush. Under Obama, offshore drilling has drastically decreased(while we're subsidizing other nations offshore drilling), EPA mandates have skyrocketed, coal mining is down, coal power plants are being shut down from the EPA mandates, E15 is coming which will void many car's warranties, etc.

$4.35 might be a small increase in current costs where you are. But here diesel is $3.80ish a gallon. So $0.55 is almost a 15% increase.

There was a report this week that a major coal mining company was shutting down several mines in the eastern mountain region( West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania) because they are changing from mining energy/fuel coal and are going to move operations to where they can mine coal for steel production which will be shipped to Asia. Thousands of jobs may be lost in that region alone because of many of the "mandates" that have been added in the past few years. The company said it is now more profitable to stop mining coal for fuel and move their entire operations over to the other type of coal that they can ship overseas. I am not even sure their operations will remain within the US, I need to look that up to be sure.

Obama has also rejected the Keystone Pipeline resulting in the Canadians agreeing to build a pipeline that will ship crude to China instead. Even his own union supporters are mad at him about that one. They're just to stupid and afraid to speak out loudly.

I blame Obama for the restrictions on building new refineries and the ethanol mandates that did, in fact, drive up both gasoline and diesel prices over the last 4 years. He's doing the same thing all the time: you must buy ethanol in your gas, you must buy health insurance, you must buy "renewable" energy, you must buy biodiesel.

“There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him.”? Robert A. Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

We're a slight net exporter of distillates, but more refineries would still be great -- we've had a trade deficit for ages, and exporting gasoline and diesel is as good a way as any to bring it down! Plus, refineries create scores of high-paying, high-skilled jobs, from all sorts of different branches of engineering and craftsmen.

This administration might want jobs, but they want something else more than jobs. I say this because every opportunity there has been to create jobs has resulted in the opposite choice of what a sane person would do.

I don't know what the issue is, but they're either stupid or doing it on purpose. Either way, I would rather vote for my dog because he is just as likely to produce jobs.